7 comments:

Apparently in addition to being a great architect, he was an expert in statics (the thing you learn in physics about structures and the forces the components exert on each other), and he designed the cantilevered parts of the Falling Water house precisely and knowing that they would hold themselves up based on their positioning and materials strength.

Later, the contractor who built the house didn't believe that the design would work, so he added extra supports to hold things up. The weight of those very supports screwed up the whole thing and made it sag. After the supports were removed, the structured recovered and held up exactly as originally designed.

You can certainly argue about Wright being the most famous one (Gaudie spring to mind). There have been a lot of well known Architect that have blended design and architecture.

I bet that Tom would certainly recognize quite a few things designed by a few of the prominent figures of the 20th century in design (MacKintosh or Horta). Funny to notice that Van Alen (Chrysler Building) has not met such a destiny.

writer: the bottom of the wikipedia article mentions that calculations done in preparation for the 2002 restoration work show that Wright's design was in fact flawed, and the cantilevers would have sagged even without the contractor's incompetence.

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